Humanverse

Vail

Vail is a girl's name that peaked in 2018, when it was the 3,050th most popular in the United States. It is given to both boys and girls. In 2025 it ranked 6,116th. About 510 Vails are alive in the United States today, and half of them are over 7.

Popularity, 1880–2025

Births per year, 1880 to 2025 0 15 30 45 60 1880 1900 1920 1940 1960 1980 2000 2020

girls named Vail boys named Vail

Girls and boys called Vail

Share of the name given to girls, 1880 to 2025 0% 25% 50% 75% 100% 1880 1900 1920 1940 1960 1980 2000 2020

years more girls than boys years more boys than girls

Both, throughout, without either side ever taking it over: 434 girls and 113 boys in all, and in 2025 the split was 19 to 6.

The girls’ share of each year’s babies of the name, in the 10 years in which at least 25 babies got it. The line touches the middle more often than there are crossings marked: a year or two on the other side is not a name changing hands, and only a move that holds for 5 counted years and reaches 60/40 is recorded as one. All 581 names that changed sex.

By the numbers

Total US births
547
Estimated living today
510
Median age today
7
Peak year
2018
Best rank
3,050th
Rank in 2025
6,116th
First recorded
1915
Girls / boys
434 / 113

How old the living Vails are

Born with the name each year, and how many of them are alive today, 1880 to 2025 0 15 30 45 60 1880 1900 1920 1940 1960 1980 2000 2020

born that year still alive today

Of the 547 babies given the name since 1915, about 510 are alive — 92 in every hundred. The dotted line is the median: half were born before 2018 and half after.

An estimate, not a count. SSA births aged forward through SSA cohort life tables, which know nothing about who left the country or arrived in it — so for a name that mostly came to America rather than being born in it, this is a floor rather than a figure. Where you fall among living Americans.

Where Vail is most common

Total births recorded in each state since 1910. Browse names by state.

Names of 2018

The most popular girls’ names the year Vail peaked:

All the names of 2018

Related names

Vail against another name

Two names on one chart, with the year one overtook the other.

Compare Vail with a name of your own

Try it on yourself

Source: US Social Security Administration, national and state baby-name files, 1880–2025. Counts include only births registered with the SSA, and names with fewer than five births in a year are not published. The living estimate applies SSA cohort life tables to those births; it counts people born in the United States, so it misses anyone who arrived later and anyone who has left.